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Structural mentoring barriers are policies, practices and cultural norms that collectively disadvantage marginalized groups and perpetuate disparities in mentoring. This study aims to better understand structural mentoring barriers at the postdoctoral training stage, which has a direct impact on faculty diversity and national efforts to retain underrepresented groups in research careers.

A diverse sample of postdoctoral scholars (“postdocs”) from across the USA were asked to participate in focus groups to discuss their training experiences. The authors conducted five 90-min focus groups with 32 biomedical postdocs, including 20 (63%) women and 15 (47%) individuals from underrepresented racial/ethnic groups (URG).

A social-ecological framework was used to categorize both the upstream and downstream manifestations of structural mentoring barriers, as well as mentoring barriers, overall. Notable structural barriers included: academic politics and scientific hierarchy; inequalities resulting from mentor prestige; the (over) reliance on one mentor; the lack of formal training for academic and non-academic careers; and the lack of institutional diversity and institutional mentor training. To overcome these barriers, postdocs strongly encouraged developing a network or team of mentors and recommended institutional interventions that create more comprehensive professional development, mentorship and belonging.

For postdoctoral scientists, structural mentoring barriers can permeate down to institutional, interpersonal and individual levels, impeding a successful transition to an independent research career. This work provides strong evidence for promoting mentorship networks and cultivating a “mentoring milieu” that fosters a supportive community and a strong culture of mentorship at all levels.

To examine how perceptions of complementary and supplementary fit and relationship quality contribute to successful mentorship co-creation.

Data were collected via cross-sectional survey of 145 mentor–protégé dyads within institutions of higher education in the USA. Mentors evaluated their perceptions of supplementary and complementary fit and relationship quality with their protégés and vice versa. Additionally, mentors evaluated their protégés’ performance, whereas protégés reported on their own learning. Data were analyzed using the actor–partner interdependence model.

Results suggest that one's own fit perceptions are most important in predicting one's evaluation of relationship quality. Additionally, for both mentor and protégé, complementary fit and supplementary fit predict evaluations of relationship quality to a similar degree. Finally, each person's perceptions of relationship quality mediated the relationships between their own perceptions of fit and mentor-rated protégé performance, but not the relationships between perceptions of fit and protégé-rated learning.

Research has often studied mentorships from the perspective of one party, which limits our understanding of mentorship co-creation. This study investigates how both parties simultaneously contribute to mentorship success, as indicated by protégé learning and performance. Additionally, the authors clarify the extent to which perceptions of different types of fit are instrumental in co-creating successful mentorships.

Racially and ethnically minoritized (REM) women continue to be underrepresented in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) programs and careers. Peer mentoring is one strategy that can support their participation. This study explores the experiences of Black women peer mentors in an online peer mentoring program at two historically Black institutions.

A qualitative case study approach was utilized to explore the impact of an online peer mentoring program on peer mentors' STEM self-efficacy, sense of community, STEM identity and intent to persist in STEM.

Analysis identified five themes relating to peer mentors' experiences in the program: (1) an “I can do this” approach: confidence and self-efficacy; (2) utility of like others; (3) “beacons of light”: intersecting and malleable identities; (4) skills development and (5) motivation and reciprocity. Further, challenges of the online relationship were shared.

The study contributes to the body of knowledge by demonstrating the utility of an online peer mentoring model among women mentors enrolled in STEM programs at two historically Black institutions. The findings support those who are historically marginalized in participating in and remaining in STEM.

This paper aims to determine the impact of mentorship on the development of self-directedness among beginner teachers in their initial years of teaching.

The researcher adopted a positivist paradigm to explore the situation of concern. Quantitative research was conducted, involving the collection and analysis of numerical data. Two closed-ended structured questionnaires were utilised, derived from the 40-item self-directed learning readiness scale (SDLRS) developed by Fisher and King, and a pre-determined questionnaire by Glazerman focused on the first-year teaching experience, induction and mentoring of beginner teachers.

Beginner teachers merely relying on the knowledge obtained from their studies is insufficient to achieve a satisfactory level of self-directedness when starting a teaching career. Most beginner teachers faced significant challenges in their early years of teaching due to the absence of mentoring support. In addition, most indicated that they resume their teaching duties and rely on their district for general support, guidance and orientation. Finally, the results have shown that mentoring positively impacts beginner teachers’ self-directedness.

The first limitation was that this study was narrowed to one South Africa University part-time B.Ed honours students working as beginner teachers in different provinces at primary and secondary schools. As a result, the findings of this research might be interpreted by some critics as one-sided and not representative of the views of most beginner teachers in South Africa who are working. The second limitation of this study is the sample size. In this study, 222 responses were received. As a result, the findings of this research might be considered not representative of the target sample size.

The presence and effective implementation of mentoring programmes in schools can positively impact beginner teachers' professional development and retention during their first years of teaching.

We contend that our research holds significance for international readership as it aims to garner attention towards potential research endeavours in diverse settings concerning mentorship programs for beginner teachers, specifically promoting self-directed learning. Our research offers opportunities to compare our findings with studies conducted in more comprehensive, comparative contexts and foster research possibilities in broader, contrasting contexts.

Based on the findings of this research, the availability and effective use of mentoring programmes would significantly affect beginner teachers' self-directedness, improve their retention rate and alleviate their teaching challenges. This study was the first research on the perceptions of the influence of mentoring on the self-directedness of beginner teachers.

Mentor secure-base support, characterized as mentor availability, noninterference and encouragement of growth, has important implications for newcomer socialization. Drawing on attachment theory, this paper aims to examine the relationship between mentor secure-base support and newcomers' workplace courage.

Data were collected at three time points with a new police officer sample (n = 124). A cross-lagged panel design was used to test the hypotheses.

Mentor secure-base support is causally precedent to newcomers' workplace courage, whereas the reverse relationship from workplace courage to mentor secure-base support was not held.

To help newcomers integrate into their organization and enhance their workplace courage, organizations should actively promote and foster mentoring relationships in which mentors can provide a secure base for mentees.

The authors' findings support that newcomers' workplace courage can be cultivated by mentor secure-base support. It provides insight for organizations to explore workplace courage development for newcomers.

The purpose of this systematic literature review is to catalog, explore and disseminate knowledge developed related to the affordances, constraints and collaborative practices of e-mentoring in order to offer recommendations for mentoring programs.

After identifying studies utilizing inclusion and exclusion criteria and a variety of relevant databases, chosen studies were organized into three categories based on e-mentoring practices.

Results reflect chat-room-based e-mentoring and e-mentoring with a video component both to have various affordances and collaborative features. These forms of e-mentoring can potentially be relevant to new teachers’ needs, may promote community and are disconnected from mentees’ school systems. A third form of e-mentoring, virtual reality e-mentoring, however, has the potential for accessibility issues and lack of relevancy to the mentoring process.

Chat-room-based e-mentoring and e-mentoring with a video component may benefit new teachers who do not have access to in-person mentors. However, these forms of e-mentoring may necessitate a component that ensures mentors and mentees alike remain consistently engaged in the e-mentoring process.

This paper utilizes generativity to explore the relationship between mentoring support and organizational identification, turnover intention and reciprocated mentoring in protégés.

The paper used a cross-sectional design with surveys administered to 351 working adults in the USA to test the hypotheses on the relationship between mentoring and turnover intention through organizational identification with first-stage moderation of generativity.

Employees who were high in generativity, mentoring support was positively associated with organizational identification and negatively associated with turnover intentions. Generativity was also positively related to reciprocated mentoring through the choice to mentor others, the number of mentees and the mentoring support provided.

The authors' results suggest organizations receive the greatest benefits when providing mentoring support to generative employees.

This study applies generativity to the context of mentoring by exploring the impact of mentoring support on identification with the organization, turnover intentions and willingness to mentor others by comparing the conditional effects of high generativity versus low generativity.

To exploit collaboration-driven innovation, in recent years, many government-sponsored innovation programs and mentor services have emerged. These services support an effective exchange of knowledge among innovation actors, including innovation mentors and enable mentor connectedness as an important factor to develop and sustain effective innovation mentors’ community of practice (CoP). The purpose of this paper is to examine the degree of connectedness in an innovation mentor CoP.

In this study, the innovation mentors CoP as part of a national innovation program is considered a network. The connectedness and assortative mixing of this CoP and the effects of these two on each other were examined by using social network measures, including component analysis, the giant component (GC) and assortativity.

The authors provide the analytical interconnectedness results for both the GC and the whole network with network analysis and assortativity measurements of three attributes of mentors (institution, title and degrees). The degree of correlation of community for the GC shows preferential attachment between high-ranking and low-ranking mentors, while preferential attachment was not observed for the whole network. The correlation coefficient for the institution attribute has the highest value for GC, while the title has the highest value for the whole network.

The study is one of the early attempts to apply social network analysis for an innovation mentor CoP. This study reveals the criticality of evaluating the GC and the whole network separately and provides a number of research and practical directions that will contribute to the development of the innovation mentor CoP.

Protean career orientation is a key element that helps explain why workers plan and manage their careers. In the field of nursing, a protean career orientation assists nurses in job search, career mobility and adapting to changing demands. Few studies have explored how nurses’ protean career orientation will lead to job search and how to make better use of the protean career orientation. This study aims to explore how a protean career orientation influences job search via career optimism and the moderating role of mentoring relationships.

This study conducted a cross-sectional survey of 309 frontline nurses from China. The questionnaire was distributed to nurses through the snowball sampling method. Jamovi 1.2.2 was used for descriptive analysis and Pearson’s correlation analysis. The relationships between the variables and their significance were tested using Process Macro 3.3.

Results show that protean career orientation was significantly related to career optimism and positively related to job search. Career optimism was significantly related to job search. The indirect effect of protean career orientation on job search through career optimism was significant. The interaction between protean career orientation and mentoring relationships was also significantly related to career optimism.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to demonstrate how nurses’ flexible career orientation significantly impacted job search through nurses’ career optimism. If nurses work in supportive mentoring relationships, the positive effect of the nurse’s protean career orientation on the job search is decreased.

This conceptual paper explores the complex, and neglected, area of mentor development in initial teacher education (ITE) in Australia. It focuses on the emotionality of mentoring, drawing on concepts of emotional labour and emotional intelligence to develop a framework of effective mentoring that helps explain the essence of a mentor’s role in supporting preservice teachers.

This conceptual paper draws together mentor-support practice wisdom and research literature from several relevant areas. It draws on constructive developmental theories and complex stage theory to reaffirm the intricate nature of mentor learning and development. This paper critiques the current utilitarian emphasis on mentoring as a way to improve student outcomes without first having clarity on how to improve mentoring itself.

We introduce the mentoring as emotional labour framework as a way to better understand the nature of mentoring within ITE and as a tool for developing more effective mentor supports. We present “exemplar cases”, which are amalgamations of field observations to illustrate aspects of the framework – however, we do not claim they provide evidence of the utility or accuracy of the framework.

Previous research and policy have tended to gloss over the skills required for effective mentoring, whereas this paper places the emotional labour of mentoring front and centre, explicitly conceptualising and describing the personal and interpersonal skills required in a way that aims to support and empower mentors to recognise existing strengths and areas of potential growth.